Community & Sustainability

Garcia gives team reason to smile

Emirates Melbourne Cup Day was a forgettable one for Andreas Wohler and Kerrin McEvoy, but they gained some small consolation at Flemington two days later.

The duo who combined with Red Cardinal in the Emirates Melbourne Cup celebrated victory with Mr Garcia in the $120,000 Twitter Trophy.

The five-year-old son of Paco Boy came as a travelling companion for Red Cardinal, who could manage only 11th in the Emirates Melbourne Cup after playing up pre-race.

"We didn’t enjoy Tuesday me and Andreas but this horse has travelled out well as a partner and he's a nice type," McEvoy said.

"This looked a nice race for him today and he did the job nicely."

Mr Garcia ($4.40 fav) accelerated quickly off a slow mid-race tempo to charge to a three-quarters-of-a-length win over Carraig Aonair ($17), who finished a short-half head in advance of third placegetter Hogmanay ($6.50).

He peeled off a 22.73-second final 400m to get home in a time of 1:49.99, which was almost three seconds outside the 1800m track record.

"The horse showed me a nice quick change of gears to get going," McEvoy said.

"The ground is probably quick enough for him, but he's going to stay on Australian shores now - he goes to Darren Weir - and he'll be a nice addition to the Weir stable."

Wohler was pleased to see Mr Garcia commence his Australian career with a win -the fourth a nine-start career - and suggested he was a horse capable of winning a good race at 2000m.

"I think they will have some fun in the coming races for him," the German trainer said. "He's a progressive horse and that's why I think he'll continue to improve.

"I think in these sort of races he'll get at least a mile-and-a-quarter."

Mr Garcia is not the only member of the Wohler team to remain in Australia to be trained by Weir, with Red Cardinal to also take up residence with Australia's leading horseman.